Top 10 CRPGs of all time

December 20th, 2011, 01:42

Originally Posted by rossrjensen
Interesting to see Ultima IX make your list. I bought it way back in the day, but I was one of those with an entirely inadequate system at the time and could not run it. I have played a bit of it over the years and thought it might be worth going back to some day. Do you think the experience would hold up today if I played it?

note: U9 probably is the odd man out when I place Skyrim in my revamped top 10,

U9 has the basic contemporary game play dynamics that would make the game playable today. I can't really remember the story but I had fun going around the world and exploring. I too bought this game on release day only to realize, like you, that my rig was totally inadequte for the job, fortunaly back in those days you could take the game back. 2 rigs later I got the game and had a blast.

However, by the time I was playing the game, I knew it was an Ultima game in name only but I was okay with that. If GOG ever gets the nerve to sell this game with all the proper patches, I will buy and replay. Now will the game hold up for a complete replay??? I don't know - but if GOG ever gets U9, I'll give it a go.

Most fun I had so far with them and was hard to decide since I played more great games then just ten.

Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura
Lionheart: Legacy of the crusader
Dungeon cleaners/Erasers I
Dungeon siege I
Dragon Age: Origins
Might and Magic VIII: Day of the Destroyer
The Bards Tale (2004)
The Witcher
Dungeon Lords
Dungeons of Dredmor(Idk if this game can count as crpg but if does not then Diablo I should be in the place)

Another opening/greeting post, seems like a good place for them. My top 10, no particular order:

1. Starflight - Nobody has =anything= on procedural worlds like Binary Systems did, plus the freakiest, most unexpected and uncomfortable ending ever. Building up my characters, buffing up my ship, exploring farther and farther reaches of space  I played this thing for MONTHS. Literally. Still wonder if Borno got his money back.

2. Ultima IV - first time I ever saw a real alternate reward system in place in an RPG  you simply couldn't win at all if you played it like any other RPG. Great ideas, many of which were never really replicated, though I swore if I fell asleep one more time on the way to the seer I was going to lose at least an eighth.

6. Ultima IX - Yeah, I know, controversial choice, but it's here for two reasons. One, the things they =tried= to do were immense, even if they failed, and two, some of the things they =did= accomplish were awesome. Yeah the game design was underwhelming; yeah the technical requirements were massive and there were more bugs in it than an Australian termite mound. But the first time I stood under a crystal dome in the ruins of New Magincia and watched the rain fall on the dome above me as the sun set, I understood where they'd tried to go with the game, and it was awe-inspiring. They get huge points for that.

7. Deus Ex - Great story, great setting, great delivery, and just enough RPG elements supported by the gameplay to make it juicy. It's borderline RPG in many ways but it was such a good hybrid it deserves a spot here.

9. Arx Fatalis - I know, I should probably have Ultima Underworld in here instead, but I liked the story better, the gameplay was a lot smoother and more fun, and it was just a bit creepier and more atmospheric because the setting was so thoroughly dire.

10. Dragon Age: Origins - such a triumphant return to party-based storytelling, such good ideas, so completely betrayed by what happened at Bioware afterwards. A brilliant opportunity, shamefully squandered. At least the replay value is high.

Honorable mentions: Fallout (loved them all but the setting completely demoralized me), Daggerfall (best of the Bethesdas, I think), Neverwinter Nights (awful stock modules but amazing community creations), Mass Effect / ME 2 (everyone has their guilty pleasures), The Witcher (basically a tie for #10 on the list) and Zangband (which I still play when I'm feeling masochistic).

WOW, I read the wiki on Starflight - what a story and what an ending. Sorta wish I hadn't done it but I don't think I would have ever gotten around to playing the game. Over at the Octopus Overlords web site, there is a thread there called "What one game would you like to see remade", and Starflight got a lot of votes.

Poor Might & Magic IV. It was my number one for a long time then it got bumped by Gothic 2 and then got bumped by Skyrim. Still, a great game and I wish more games would incorporate flying as and end game feature. My former number one Wizardry can't make the list-it just to cumbersome for this modern day gamer (in that game if you died you had to create a party to get your dead characters)

And Betryal at Krondor - the one feature I wish Skyrim would have incorporated into the game was my Bards ability to play in Taverns. They sorta did it in Two Worlds 2 although for some reason the developers felt they had to turn it into a mini game. But BAK had you playing in Taverns and when you start off your musical career you are total crap - that was wonderful.

As you can see you are not alone in you game love for U9. The scene that got it for me was a nite time scene by some whimsical cottages. There were glow bugs, shinny plants and lighted windows - just blew me away.

anyways - keep posting

Last edited by Dajjer; December 23rd, 2011 at 03:38.
Reason: switch witcher with 2worlds2

Originally Posted by Dajjer
And Betryal at Krondor - the one feature I wish Skyrim would have incorporated into the game was my Bards ability to play in Taverns. They sorta did it in Two Worlds 2 although for some reason the developers felt they had to turn it into a mini game. But BAK had you playing in Taverns and when you start off your musical career you are total crap - that was wonderful.

I'd really like to play through BAK one day. I've heard so much praise about it that I know it must be a great game. The problem is that I just can't get past the graphics. I normally don't have any problems adjusting to older visuals, but BAK is so pixelated that I can't even tell what I'm looking at sometimes. I'm still hoping that someday someone will give it a graphical ugrade.

My top 10, based on an occasionally unhealthy CRPG habit of about three decades:

1) Angband: You could argue this back to Rogue, but this is the roguelike I spent the most amount of time on (and dozens of its derivatives). It has the largest amount of actual game-play content than just about any commercial release, and it is absolutely free. Some really extraordinary variants out there too. Part of what really appealed to me was the challenge level of it. It takes quite awhile to master, and satisfies the inner loot whore in all of us.

2) Wizardry series: Yeah, I'm cheating by putting several games in one position. This really set the bar for me as a kid for the kinds of games I enjoyed the most. Loved the challenge of the first three, and loved the interactivity/puzzles in Bane the most (that's the 6th).

3) Bard's Tale I & II: Yeah, cheating again by doubling up games. Absolutely loved what these games did with the Ultima/Wizardry formula. So much good content, challenging combat, riddles, mapping—just plain fun. The third one I believe had an automap feature and really seemed to dumb down the series for me. Plus an exploitable experience bug in the beginning and my complete lack of willpower in abusing it ruined most of the game for me.

4) Might and Magic 1 & 2: Again, loved the challenge of these games, the vast amount of content sans empty space (unlike most modern games that just manage to make lots of emptiness in their open world settings). I remember getting all excited looking at the maps that came with these games, because every square was packed with something interesting. I enjoyed all the other M&M games as well, but never felt the same level of challenge as in these two. Incidentally, I didn't beat either of them—got close to the end but gave up for some reason or another. I seem to remember in M&M II hating that encounters scaled a bit with levels—every random fight seemed to have +256 of something and I just got tired. But damn, what a game up until that point.

5) Wasteland: First non-fantasy CPRG that blew me away. Great content, puzzles, encounters, skill system, just lots of fun. Incinerating my entire party in a nuclear meltdown was an interesting little memory as well.

6) Planetscape Torment: Great story, writing, encounters, variety, humor, etc. Nice to play a game not catering to your average middle schooler. Definitely a favorite.

7) Baldur's Gate 2: I enjoyed the first, but as a AD&D nerd for many years, this game really nailed the high-level experience. Challenging fights and everything. Sad to say I never played the Throne of Bhaal expansion.

8) Deathlord: One of the few CRPGs that actually kicked my ass. I got really far in it too, but it was just absolutely brutal. I even returned to it on an Apple emulator some years later, got farther, but some nasty map puzzle made me shelve it for eternity. Still, loved the Oriental-themed take on the Ultima formula. And it had really cool new spells (this back in the days where the manuals were actually worth reading).

9) Ultima II-IV: I think II was actually my real favorite. Just something cool about stealing a phase blaster from a merchant and rocking the world with it for awhile. Loved how Ultima II mixed science and fantasy. III was fun for the variety it built upon the Ultima II formula, while IV was just revolutionary for the way it made you actually care about your decision making process. While I played most of them after IV, I didn't like how they kind of got away from imaginative fantasy to more of a Arthurian themed, real-world simulation. I like my fantasy to be a bit more escapist than that.

10) Eye of the Beholder: Just an awesome application of the D&D rules to a 1st person perspective. Plus the inclusion of an in-game contest on its release didn't hurt crazy players like me that prided themselves on finishing games in single, marathon play sessions. Yeah, that notion ended in high school, in case you're wondering. But 48 hours of nothing but quality CRPG goodness was as good as it got back in those days.

Honorable mentions:

Dungeon Master: I played this after EoB, not sure which was first offhand, but I loved what it did with the Wizardry formula, its skill building/spell casting system, challenging maps, etc.

Etrian's Odyssey I-III: Okay, I know, not a computer RPG but I never did specify what the "C" meant in my post, did I? This game takes the challenge of old-school and makes it fresh again. I love its built in map-building tools as well, and it comes from the days of quality over quantity. Great recent find for me.

Dark Spire: Another console game I'm slipping in this list, but again, like Etrian's Odyssey, does old school right. A few lame puzzles here or there, but overall one of the best game experiences I've had in years.

Demon Souls: I love the atmosphere of the game. Not terribly fond of action games and especially platforming elements (this had a few). Didn't finish it either—got fairly close, but couldn't beat those two demons on the narrow bridge—apparently this game punishes you for repeated failure by making the thing that kicked your ass even harder the next time. Died so many times to those two that it's probably better to start the game over. Haven't bought the sequel yet because I liked the first one too much to pass over it without winning.

Pool of Radiance: My favorite of the SSI Gold Box series. Just a great game, fairly lengthy, good character development progress, encounter variety, etc.

Phantasy 1-3: I just remember really enjoying these as a kid. Something cool about smashing a statue of Zeus, it coming to life, and getting to fight him. And even though the graphics were lousy, they do scaling right.

Gothic 1 & 2: I know people are huge fans of these games on this site. I enjoyed the first couple quite a bit. Didn't feel different enough after those—I really like a sense of newness in my games—undiscovered creatures, areas, items, etc.

Anachronox: Great puzzles (Bepidris!), humor, combat. A consolesque game on a PC. Wish this would have had a sequel.

That is so true, great gameplay and great story. The last time I gave BAK a shot (about 3 years ago) I was thinking how the game had a George Seurat type quality (A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte). And perhaps the game designers actually made the game look like that on purpose. BAK clearly looks vastly different than Might & Magic 5, Ultima Underworld 2 and Land of Lore 1 which also all came out in 1993.

Dajjer, I don't think anyone should feel bad about reading the wiki on Starflight; trying to play that game on the PC now  all those hours at 320x240 with only cyan, magenta and white as your friends is almost certainly beyond me, too (yeah, I know there's a Genesis version for emus  but you know how it goes when it's not 'your' version). That said I would LOVE to see a real spiritual successor with modern interface sensibilities and a graphical update. SC2 came close, and I love that game too, but I'm not really sure it quite qualifies as an RPG in the strictest sense.

And Gothic's right about the graphics on BAK; it's weird but they really do 'go good' if you play for long enough. Hard to explain; maybe Dajjer's right about the art in a sense. I'm not quite sure I'm ready to completely agree with the Seurat observation (though it is an interesting one), but the fact that the art's been consistently directed (ignore the wigs please) contributes a lot.

Anachronox! Completely forgot that one, thanks Adam. Definitely deserves a spot on the honorable mention list. Really wanted a sequel there too  or one more bugfix. Just one!

Very nice lists AdamH and Morduun. I like reading people's favorites that have more "experience" (for lack of a better term) playing RPG's than I do.

It appears a few people have a soft spot for Ultima IX. One of these days I am going to make a run of it. I fired it up recently and was pretty impressed with how well the graphics have held up. They're not amazing, but pretty solid still. I need to play Ultima VII first though

Originally Posted by Harlequin
I decided to expand and make a entire blog post about my top 10, you can read it here, enjoy!

Okay Harlequin, now that you did your blog duty - just go ahead and Cut&Paste your list here. :-)

BTW, I too feel a little guilty about putting not only Skyrim but Fallout Vegas on any revised top ten by me. But sometimes when you're playing a game your realize at the very time you're playing the game that it's a great game. It happened to me with Might & Magic 6, No One Lives Forever, X-Com, Fallout Vegas and now Skyrim.

I think MM7 has been properly given its due here. M&M7 had that find and then furnish your castle feature that was pretty unique in its time. I loved M&M7 but for me it just came out too close to 6 and pretty much seemed like and expansion to the M&M6 world - it really did not seem like a different game at all. AND I HAD NO PROBLEM WITH THAT. But when I pick between the two I have to give the nod to 6.

Now if Skyrim has a sequel next year and it take place in Elsweyr or Valenwood with the exact same game mechanics as Skyrim, I will be there. But Skyrim will get my vote as the better game.

10 - Super Mario RPG - First RPG to take place in the Mario world. It was great that the main villain wasn't Bowser this time, and that he could actually join your party in the fight. Some great music to be found here too, such as Geno's Maze Theme, and others. Also was innovative in the fact it added some platforming gaming to an RPG. Brilliant game.

9 - Sukoden 3 - Had a very interesting story telling system in which a similar story was being told from 3 unique vantage points. It really made you care about the main characters as their lives intermixed. Classic Suikoden gameplay with a possible 108 party members. Gotta find 'em all! Great game.

8 - Tactics Ogre - Let Us Cling Together - The best turn-based strategy game ever. Had more depth in the gameplay than Final Fantasy Tactics, and if a character died in battle, they died forever! That was very innovative and hardcore at the time. I will never forget playing in a way that ensured all my main characters wouldn't die. Had a very cool political story with a few branching choices to be made, and based on your decisions certain party members would or wouldn't join you. A very good game.

7 - Suikoden - While Suikoden 3 is probably the better game, the original Suikoden shines as being the first game in existence where you could collect up to 108 possible party members, hidden all throughout the land. At the time it was simply incredibly fun to collect them all and try them all in battle. If you found the right combination of characters it would create a special attack you could choose in battle, and half the fun was trying to find these special combinations. Also told a cool political story and had fun gameplay. A classic RPG.

6 - Lost Odyssey - Just a flat out beautiful game. A love letter to classic RPG gaming, such as the classic Final Fantasy series. First RPG I've ever played where the main characters are actually immortal and can't die, and this leads to many interesting twists along the way. Beautiful story sequences told through short stories actually made me tear up once or twice. The music is equally brilliant as well. Overall, a gem of an RPG.

5 - Final Fantasy 6 - A great JRPG where you played the main role as a magical Esper character. Had an interesting cast of characters, a great villain in Kefka, and an incredibly epic "twist" which changed the entire game world completely. Up to this point I'd never seen that type of twist in a video game before, and it was just simply epic. A game I can still play today and have lots of fun.

4 - Skyrim - It may have just came out, but Skyrim is easily one of the best games I've ever played. The atmosphere, the immersion factor, the exploration, the sights and sounds, everything about this game is mesmerizing. Probably the most immersive game I've ever played, as I can just lose myself for hours at a time in this game. Great game.

3 - Morrowind - The first TES game I had the pleasure of playing. I'll never forget my dad buying this game at a yard sale, coming home and popping it in the Xbox, not knowing what to expect, and being completely blown away by my first open-world experience ever. The game was massive. The world was alien. There were so many secrets to uncover and things to discover in this game, it just blew my mind. There is a level of hand-placement of both loot and enemies that makes this game very special.

2 - Final Fantasy 7 - This is probably part nostalgia, but FF7 also captured my imagination as a child and didn't let go. I'll always remember Aeris, and Sephiroth, and Cloud, and the Weapon enemies (that took me forever to finally beat them), and Cid, and I could go on forever with this game. I'll never forget Chocobo racing, and breeding a Chocobo in order to get all the secret loot that was hidden in the near impossible to reach places. My first ever game where the time played read 99:99:99, for the majority of time I played it! A true classic.

1 - Chrono Trigger - This game just mesmerized me as a kid, and still does to this day. Fantastic graphics, brilliant music that I still play to this day, a very unique and imaginative story, memorable and lovable characters, fun gameplay, this game has everything. A work of art. Unmatched by any RPG I've ever played, nothing has since captured my imagination as much as this game. And to think it was all done on the lowly SNES.

Originally Posted by Dajjer
I think MM7 has been properly given its due here. M&M7 had that find and then furnish your castle feature that was pretty unique in its time. I loved M&M7 but for me it just came out too close to 6 and pretty much seemed like and expansion to the M&M6 world - it really did not seem like a different game at all. AND I HAD NO PROBLEM WITH THAT. But when I pick between the two I have to give the nod to 6.

MM6 had a bigger world and better dungeons, but I still prefer MM7. The thing that made MM7 better was the extra complexity to party development. With MM6, every character could eventually be equally good at every skill. Once you got past the first dozen levels or so, your choice of starting classes was pointless. In MM7, with the expert/master/GM caps tied to each class, you had to think about how you made up your party and (much like Wiz8) inevitably you couldn't have the best of everything in one party. Choices like that made character and party development far more interesting and also gave the game much better replayability.

— Sorry. No pearls of wisdom in this oyster.
Dallas Cowboys: Let's Get to Work / / Detroit Red Wings: Welcome, Coach Blash!

8 - Tactics Ogre - Let Us Cling Together - The best turn-based strategy game ever. Had more depth in the gameplay than Final Fantasy Tactics, and if a character died in battle, they died forever! That was very innovative and hardcore at the time. I will never forget playing in a way that ensured all my main characters wouldn't die. Had a very cool political story with a few branching choices to be made, and based on your decisions certain party members would or wouldn't join you. A very good game.

Glad to see this game on here, fantastic game… there is remake out for the PSP.

1 - Chrono Trigger - This game just mesmerized me as a kid, and still does to this day. Fantastic graphics, brilliant music that I still play to this day, a very unique and imaginative story, memorable and lovable characters, fun gameplay, this game has everything. A work of art. Unmatched by any RPG I've ever played, nothing has since captured my imagination as much as this game. And to think it was all done on the lowly SNES.